It was with great fanfare the aliens had arrived. Walking down a glistening red carpet, the foremost hodling a strange cube in his hands.
One of the aliens took a step forward and begun to speak. "Humans, as is tradition. You will now receive the technology package." As he spoke he gestured towards the cube. "Inside is the technology that will bring you to the stars. Only one thing is asked in exchange. You will be given a map of the galaxy with certain systems marked. These are off limits, and should never be visited. The Ancient Ones live there, and they do not wish to be disturbed." At the end, he picked up and handed the cube to the human representative.
"Why?" asked the surprised and nervous human. Holding the cube as if it was made from feathers, and the slightest wind would blow it apart.
"We do not know. All we know is that a long time ago the Ancient put together this package as a compromise. Its been tradition to bring it fort to any new species discovered since then."
"So, you wont stop us or anything?" responded the human.
'sigh' "Human foolishness is not for us to decide."
And so they left. Haven brought forth the gifts that would grant humanity access to the stars.
Human curiosity is a difficult beast to cage, and eventually, after many years, a ship was built named Stick. It was sent at the closest marked system. As it entered the system it was immediately destroyed.
This would have caused some species to pause, and thinks things over. And the humans did that, then decided they needed a bigger ship. Both faster and longer named, Bigger Stick.
It managed to survive for a whole minute within the system before it was destroyed. Some simple readings made this a groundbreaking success.
A few years later and a continuous stream of ships are jumping into the system and getting destroyed. Acquiring more and more detailed information. Eventually a potential weak spot is discovered. A communication ship, named Sticky in honor of its successor, is sent into it.
Success, it survives for almost a complete hour. Gets some transmissions that are later decoded to be roughly "What the hell are you doing?".
Another communication ship is sent in. Previous transmission is repeated to the ship that this time had a ready reply, "Hello!"
And so it came to be. The humans become the first in living memory, to establish contact with the Ancient Ones.